June 2013

June 25, 2013

June is a time for celebration on our campus! You will find
wedding ceremonies, retirement parties (our very own Dr.
Margret Korzus is retiring this month), and graduations. After earning
their degrees through determination, our students’ achievements are celebrated
during our June Commencement ceremonies. In addition to celebrating with
family, friends and classmates, our graduates are inspired by fantastic
commencement speakers. This year our graduate commencement ceremonies featured
a United Nations Secretary-General, a United States Senator, and the Mayor of
the City of Denver. You can watch the speeches from United
Nations-Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon
and Denver
Mayor Michael Hancock. United
States Senator Michael Bennett was the commencement speaker for the Sturm
College of Law graduating class of2013.

I was fortunate enough to attend the undergraduate
commencement ceremony. In addition to seeing some of our fantastic student
fellows and tour guides graduate, I was able to witness my sister-in-law (Mariah
Grindle) walk across the graduation stage in the Daniel L. Ritchie Center’s
Magness Arena. She is the third member of our family to graduate from DU in the
last ten years!

Our students’ creativity was on full display with the décor of
their graduation caps. There was a jubilant buzz in the air as our
graduating students, faculty, staff, families, friends, and the Chancellor of
the University anticipated the start of the ceremony. The
Undergraduate Study Government Vice President and Admission Fellow, Parker
Calbert, delivered an inspiring speech to her fellow graduates. After
receiving an Honorary Degree from the University of Denver, Mayor Hancock spoke
as the feature speaker of the undergraduate commencement ceremony. During his
speech, Mayor Hancock reminisced on his graduation and the feelings that he
experienced. Mayor Hancock addressed the graduates and explained, “As I think
about my commencement, there were two things I was thinking: 1) I wish this dude would hurry up and get
this over with and 2) just like you all, I was sitting there ready to get this
party started.”

We look forward to the incoming class of 2017 starting or
continuing their family legacy at the University of Denver in less than 100
days! Until then, keep calm and celebrate.

June 18, 2013

Summer break is a great time to unwind from your junior year
and relish the fact that you are now a senior in your last year of high
school. There is so much to look forward
to as a senior including the applications you will prepare for the college
deadlines in the fall. Wouldn’t it be
great to alleviate some of the stress and time constraints of the application
process before your senior year begins?

Make a plan and do it now.
It is widely known that the college admission essay will almost always
take the most amount of time to complete.
You will need to decide on a topic, prepare, write, rewrite, review, and
finalize your essay. There may be a
specific application essay question or topic already determined by a college or
university. You might be given freedom to
choose your own topic or what you would like to write about. Don’t forget about the word limits too. Some essay may allow for 250 words, others
for 500. Each one can and may be different. Check
the requirements for each of the colleges you are applying to.

How do you think you should begin? I suggest setting aside an hour or more each
week this summer to allow yourself time to complete your essay from the point
of development of your topic to the
final copy. If you committed one hour
per week, you would be further ahead than most. You would be free to focus your efforts on the
essay and not have your academic and extracurricular commitments to contend
with during the regular school year.

So really, what are mere hours out of your 62 day summer
break worth? By setting aside a small
amount of time to work on your college applications during the summer break, you
will still have a great deal of time to relax and enjoy your friends and family
or other commitments. When your senior
year begins you will be one ‘stressless’ step closer to completing your college
applications.

June 11, 2013

From our current Media Fellow and Undergraduate Student Government Vice-President, Parker Calbert, on one of her last days as an undergraduate at DU...

It is my last Monday as a DU undergraduate.
As I prepare for final tests and papers, it is hard not to feel a bit
nostalgic. The past four years have been nothing shy of incredible. I struggle
to engrain each of the wonderful memories and adventures into my mind as
souvenirs. Inevitably, I am bound to forget some of them. Nevertheless, I am
grateful for each day, each experience, each challenge, each opportunity that
the University of Denver has provided for me. So, that is what I will speak
about at Graduation on Saturday as the student commencement speaker. There is
not enough time at Graduation to recount every laugh, triumph and tear.
Instead, I will encourage my peers to continue saying YES to opportunity even
as our opportunities as an undergraduate at the University of Denver draw to a
close.

For those of you who will not be
at Graduation, here is what I will share:

Good
Morning! I’m Parker Calbert, your
Undergraduate Student Body Vice President and let me be one of the first to
say… Congratulations to the class of 2013!
Whether we have been together for four years or just a few since you
transferred to DU, we have had a college experience filled with excitement and
opportunity. I know for me, opportunity arrived at my door in the form of an
acceptance letter in early 2009. I can still remember ripping open the
envelope, scrambling to unfold the paper and feeling a wave of excitement
rush over me when I read the word ‘Congratulations’. Reflecting on this
treasured memory, I can remember being so naïve about all that was in store for us
at the University of Denver.

For
me, my college career can be summed up in one word. Opportunity. Last fall, our university had the
unbelievable opportunity to host the first Presidential Debate of 2012. When I
was asked if I was interested in helping organize the debate, I immediately
responded YES and jumped into full planning mode. We were going to need students
as volunteers and events to build excitement and giveaway items to commemorate
the day and ways to plan for everything we couldn’t think of. Planning the
debate often felt like trying to assemble a bicycle as the tires rolled down
the hill ahead of you. Moving parts were simply the name of the game. Yet, when
it was all said and done, when Jim Lehrer delivered his send off “Thank you and
good night University of Denver” while sitting right about where I am standing
now, that is when I understood what opportunity truly meant at DU.

Standing
before you today, I still find myself a bit starry-eyed about what the past
four years as an undergraduate at DU has meant to me. As I am certain many of
you can relate, college has been about an opportunity to meet extraordinary
people and cultivate meaningful relationships; an opportunity to challenge
myself intellectually and through life experiences such as studying abroad; an opportunity
to ask myself, what is it that I am truly passionate about.

Today
marks the end of our chapter as undergraduates. It is most certainly
bittersweet to cherish the memories of our undergraduate career knowing that
there really is no other comparable experience in life. Nevertheless, as we
cross this stage today, we are greeted by our next opportunity. The opportunity
to take everything we have learned, felt, and experienced as an undergraduate
at DU and develop it into our life’s purpose. It’s more than simply finding a
job - though that certainly takes some stress off of things, and makes our
parents happy. It is about pursuing the opportunity to wake up each morning and
absolutely love what you do. For me, opportunity means continuing to find ways
to serve my community and enrich the lives of those around me. For you,
opportunity may mean something entirely different - like accounting. Regardless,
a wise friend and role-model once explained, life is never easy, but it is
simple. When we say YES to opportunity, simple things like an acceptance letter
in the mail provide unbelievable adventures. I look forward to hearing about
your future adventures and I’m happy to have shared this one with you.

So Class of 2013, thank you for an amazing
four years. It has been quite THE opportunity.

June 10, 2013

On May 29th, two world-music groups drew
an audience that filled Hamilton Hall as part of the Expanding
Horizons Initiative here on campus. Several Senegalese natives, numerous
students, and many people from the Denver community came to watch University
students perform traditional bákks,
led by Vieux Tourè of the Kaolack Region in Senegal, and Kathak dances
choreographed by Prof. Sarah Morelli.

Undergraduate students of all ages and disciplines took part
in the drumming ensemble and in the classical ensemble. They learned the
historical context of the art form, traditional dance techniques, and lyrics in
the Wolof language and Hindustani respectively.

Marsala “Mass” Mbaye, who led the Senegalese Drumming
Ensemble until last year, and Dallo Fall, a talented West-African dancer and
professor of dance at Colorado College, made guest appearances at the concert. Music
students from Lamont performed with Mbaye and Touré to create Groupe Waarwi:
Senegalese Popular Music.

The Senegalese Drumming Ensemble and North Indian
Classical Ensemble are among many culturally enriching experiences offered at
the University of Denver. We hope you’ll join us for future performances that
are a part of the DU World Music Series and the Expanding Horizons Initiative!

June 04, 2013

Often
times Admission Counselors get asked, “Do you get the summer off?” And when the answer is no, there is the quick
follow up question of, “Well, what do you do all summer?”

Let
me start by saying that we have no problem staying busy!

Summer
time is our time to dig ourselves out of our offices. I’ll spend a good week cleaning up my
computer and reorganizing my office into a sane space again.

Before
we know it, we have a list (getting longer by the minute) of summer
projects. For me, as part of our
communication team, this includes working on next year’s print publications -
developing content and approving new design concepts. In addition, there is the World Wide Web that
needs our attention! We’ll go through
and make sure that everything is correct, up-to-date and, of course, looking
good.

Next
are a lot of meetings! These are all
designed to help us evaluate the past year and brainstorm changes and next steps for the future.

As
the summer continues, we will start to plan for fall travel - analyzing trends from the last few years, decide
where we will be visiting and start getting in touch with high schools to
schedule visits.

Now,
don’t get me wrong, summertime also includes vacations, actual lunch breaks and
of course, enjoying the beauty that is the DU campus during the summer! Here are some great shots from my lunchtime
walk today.